Immersing yourself in Italian cultural products is among the most effective ways to practice your language skills and get a glimpse of everything related to 2026 Italy—including trending topics, memes, slang, and niche areas—in other words, culture.
A few premises are due. First, what interests you most is always the best choice for learning—and that applies to music, TV shows, movies, you name it. Second, you probably don’t need any help in finding social-media-related content. Third, leaving your comfort zone is usually a good idea. That said, let’s see how you can step up your Italian in a fun and engaging way, focusing on two cultural products: podcasts and sports (which you can follow via podcasts as well as old-school TV).
Podcasts
In the last decade, podcasts in Italy have boomed, so much so that many wonder: Dove si trova il tempo per ascoltarli tutti?! [Where does one find the time to listen to them all?!] The most popular topics are true crimes, with Elisa True Crime and Indagini having gain the classici status at this point; daily press reviews; and history. This last one might come as a surprise, but Italy does have a superstar historian: Professor Alessandro Barbero. Historian (specialised in the Middle Ages) and writer, Barbero is highly celebrated—even by very young people—for popularising history in a very engaging, accessible, simple yet accurate way. His podcasts are incredibly successful, and his live presentations are *events*—he speaks like your very best friend sharing interesting facts and bringing them to life.
Sports
Since Italian soccer does not really need to be further promoted, how about following some other sports in which Italians stand out? Tennis is having a big moment: 25-year-old Jannik Sinner is currently ranked world No. 1 by the ATP, and his era-defining rivalry with the Spanish Alcaraz is as fascinating as a TV show. Matteo Berrettini, Lorenzo Musetti, Jasmine Paolini, Lucrezia Stefanini, Sara Errani: There are many other players to keep an eye on. If you need an extra reason, you might want to observe Stefanini’s two-handed forehand —an uncommon and unorthodox stroke where players use both hands on the racket for their forehand side.
Another sport that is having a moment is volleyball. Both the women’s and the men’s national teams have been dominating internationally for quite some time. The women’s team has a very charismatic coach, Julio Velasco —whose charisma goes well beyond volleyball to embrace life, and that’s not an overstatement—and exceptional players like Paola Egonu, Miriam Sylla, and Monica De Gennaro.
Finally, this is undoubtedly a golden era for Italian track and field athletes. In addition to the already famous and established Gianmarco Tamberi, Marcell Jacobs, and Antonella Palmisano, who did great at the Tokyo 2020 and 2024 Paris Olympic Games, there’s a whole new generation of athletes —AKA Gen Z athletes— who are doing great already and brought Italy to the top of Europe this current summer, during the 2026 European Athletics Championships. Italy, indeed, topped the final medal table with 22 medals, including 10 gold medals.
As mentioned before, engaging with authentic Italian cultural products and trends —and yes, memes too!— can help you tremendously in acquiring not only linguistic skills (subtitles be blessed!) but also cross-cultural awareness and competency. Provaci! Fidati!
By Claudia Quesito
Also read:
The Italy Language Students Know—and the Italy They Haven’t Met Yet
